Microsoft is preparing to ship its Windows Phone 8.1 update with two significant changes: a notification center and a Siri-like personal assistant. Sources familiar with Microsoft's plans have revealed to The Verge that the company is currently beta testing copies of Windows Phone 8.1 internally, with plans to fully detail its features at BUILD 2014 in April. A highly requested notification center feature will be added to the software, and we're told it's enabled by swiping down from the top of the screen in a similar way to iOS and Android.

They serve a diff purpose. The user wants to know what happened in the last minute? Notification Centre is there for that. Live Tiles don't do that. It's not a big deal on Windows 8 because of the app situation and most users still using mostly desktop apps. But on Windows Phone, it's more apparent.

I find the Live Tiles not a very effective way of displaying information.

I'd rather have a list. You can instantly see what's on it. With Live Tiles you stare at them to see if they change or not and not that many fit on a screen.

The people Live Tiles shows a picture, then you wait wait wait and it turns out nothing happens. Or it does. During that time you can easily read a whole list of notifications.

My Facebook tile shows a 1, a 2 or some other number, but at least a 1 and often a 2. When I launch Facebook there are 0 notifications, but the Tile keeps displaying 1. Or 2. Other Tiles that could/should display something don't.

So even if it works it's not very effective, but in my experience it often doesn't even work correctly.